Over the last few months, we have teased you all with exciting updates to our ruleset and polled for your thoughts in phases such as deployment, magic casting and terrain to just mention a few that will eventually form the 2nd Edition. Today you can find out when you can get you hands on it.

So ... why even do this update?
Last year the team started work on the 2nd Edition, but this wasn't to be another 1.3 with patches over this or that, but instead the team stripped everything back to the bone. After this, they looked closely at each aspect of the game and with many aims in mind, i.e. built with flavour, simplification of stupid rules, a great set of features to build army books upon and so forth yet at the same time, keep the fundamentals of movement, shooting, magic and combat!

To this end we turned to the the greatest source of inspiration, the community which has provided hundreds of new ideas for the different phases along with countless different ways of rules interacting, many more than the teams could ever have come up with. Finally, as this is distilled down into the final volume, we can start to release this to the public.

Start? This sounds intriguing....
It sure does and here is how it's going to work. Right now the team is putting the finishing touches to 2nd Edition and having it tested by our own internal playtesters. At some point before the end of 2017, 2nd Edition initial publication will be released to the public for optional playtesting. This means that, while the 2nd Edition rules will be available, 1.3.x will remain available to download and use. This release will include both core 2nd Edition and an update (not full rewrite!) of all armybooks to be aligned to the rules of 2nd Edition.

Over the following months, this ruleset will be openly tweaked based on the feedback we get from the community. As time goes on, fewer major tweaks will be needed and only minor ones should be considered. Then, during Spring 2018, T9A 2nd Edition will become stable and will replace 1.3.x as THE official version. This will mean 2nd Edition core rules are very, very close to their final stage and can be enjoyed by everyone.

Come Autumn 2018, T9A will release 2nd Edition "GOLD" as it is called by some industries which will then be stable and unchanged ruleset for a period of years! For clarity, this involves the core rule book and the magic paths only.

Whoah, that's a lot to take on board, Initial Release eh? How do I help with this?
By playing as many games as you can and feeding your thoughts back to us via our forums. Polls will be run as well to assist us with ensuring the right paths are being taken but most importantly, it's going to be your feedback which makes a difference

Initial Release? Pah I don't want to use a Initial Release!
Good news then! During this time, our current 1.3 ruleset will remain the official ruleset and be available to download so that if you don't want to participate in creating the future you don't have to. Come the 2nd Edition stability release near late spring 2018, v1.3 ruleset will be removed for good as by this point the 2nd Edition will be considered stable and close to be the final product (GOLD). Either way you get to have the best of both worlds, use 1.3 that you are currently using or the 2nd Edition with all the new amazing features and updated army books!

Updated Army Books? Tell me more!
That's right, 2nd Edition will see not only the new ruleset released but also each book is getting updated to use the new rules found in 2nd Edition. Now it should be pointed out that each armybook is not being reworked like the Warriors of the Dark Gods or Daemon Legions book, just tweaked and balanced to work fully within the 2nd Edition rules.

Wait, will you publish updated army books for 1.3?
Sadly not. Instead of spending the manpower on releasing an updated 1.3 now and then updated 2nd Edition in some months, we have decided to focus the manpower in offering you the 2nd Edition earlier, even though that means not having a Balance Patch for v1.3 now. We believe the best path is to not look back to the past but instead create the future!!!

Talking of Rulebooks, will WoTDG and DL be available at 2nd Edition Initial release
We had originally wanted to have had four army books available for release but, as development progressed, we realised that a house without foundations wouldn't be a good one. Hence, instead of putting more energy and time into the army books, the focused shift over to the 2nd Edition Rule Book. WotDG and DL were a special case in this regard, since their development was already pretty far down the road. Hence, changes to the core rules didn't influence them as drastically as you might think.

While the WotDG army book is already in the internal playtesting phase (and provide crucial information for our designers) the DL book is not as close. However, both redesigned army books, are planned to have a 2nd Edition inital release. Please keep in mind, we are committed to NOT release an army book unless we are 120% happy with it.

Once 2nd Edition is released, we can be full steam ahead with the new army books and boy, we have some great ideas for them...

Anything else in store?
I could tell you about the work being done on the new background book or the new ideas being dreamed up by the team looking at the campaign book, but why spoil another news story?

We hope you like our news. Please feel free to discuss and add your thoughts here